TY - JOUR
AU - Scellato,Giuseppe
AU - Franzoni,Chiara
AU - Stephan,Paula
TI - Mobile Scientists and International Networks
JF - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL - No. 18613
PY - 2012
Y2 - December 2012
DO - 10.3386/w18613
UR - http://www.nber.org/papers/w18613
L1 - http://www.nber.org/papers/w18613.pdf
N1 - Author contact info:
Giuseppe Scellato
Politecnico di Torino
Department of Management and Production Engineerin
C.so Duca degli Abruzzi 24
10129 Turin, Italy
E-Mail: giuseppe.scellato@polito.it
Chiara Franzoni
Department of Management, Economics
and Industrial Engineering
Politecnico di Milano
20133 Milan
Italy
Tel: +39.02.2399.4823
Fax: +39.02.2399.2730
E-Mail: chiara.franzoni@polimi.it
Paula Stephan
Department of Economics
Andrew Young School of Policy Studies
Georgia State University
Box 3992
Atlanta, GA 30302-3992
Tel: 404/413-0160
Fax: 404/413-0145
E-Mail: pstephan@gsu.edu
AB - This paper explores the link between mobility and the presence of international research networks. Data come from the GlobSci survey of authors of articles published in 2009 in four fields of science working in sixteen countries. Summary evidence suggests that migration plays an important role in the formation of international networks. Approximately 40 percent of the foreign-born researchers report having kept research links with colleagues in their country of origin. Non-mobile researchers are less likely to collaborate with someone outside their country than are either the foreign born or returnees. When the non-mobile collaborate, their networks span fewer countries. Econometric results are consistent with the hypothesis that internationally mobile researchers contribute significantly to extending the international scope and quality of the research network in destination countries at no detriment to the quality of the research performed. Results also suggest that the "foreign premium" on collaboration propensity is driven in large part by mobile researchers who either trained or worked outside the destination country where they were surveyed in 2011. With but one exception, the mobility findings persist when we estimate models separately for the US, Europe, and other countries.
ER -